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IYADAI SHINJI
--:rs.:ated by Shiol] Kono
~ction by Thomas

Lamarre

Transformation of Semantics
in the History of Japanese
Subcultures since 1992
Editor's Introduction
A sociologist known for his work on pop culture phenomena and also some-

mg of a cultural phenomenon himself, Miyadai Shinji has authored and

::;=iauthored dozens of books on topics ranging from government policy and
:mn criticism to sex and subcultures. These include Sabukaruchaa shinwa kai:li (1993, Dismantling the subculture myth, with Ishihara Hideki and Otsuka
~o), Maboroshi no kogai (1997, The phantom suburbs). and Kibo, dannen,
~n. eiga (2004, Hope, abandonment, good news, film), to name just a few.
:be essay that follows reviews and updates some of his early work on sub~es, with an emphasis on formations relevant to the study of otaku and
mime. Miyadai's focus is on the semantics (imiron) surrounding these subcul:mes. semantics" here is a frame informed by the work of Niklas Luhmann,
.bat translator Shion Kono glosses as a set of concepts and statements that
m.able communication within a certain social context.n 1
Miyadai's essay is interesting for the way it investigates some of the con:3cting images and stereotypes surrounding otaku and Japanese youth=.at they are socially withdrawn spectators yet compulsive digital communi::ators; or sexual naifs whose literacy lies in pornography; or ineffectual fans
who harbor apocalyptic fantasies. Miyadai provides an overview but also

complicates these tropes by arranging them into different phases or stages

in the evolution of otaku and other youth subcultures. For example, he juxtaposes otaku with youth sexual cultures such as enjo kosai-part-time sexual
or dating relationships between young teenage girls and older sugar daddies.
For Miyadai, these new kinds of sexual relationships and the world of the
otaku are two sides of the same coin, both indicative of an age in which the
paramount concern is maintaining the outlines of the self, whether through
aggressive sexual engagement or passive withdrawal.
Miyadai links these trends to broader currents in Japanese society. His
equation of sex and religion as parallel sources of self-definition is striking,
for instance. He situates the rising appeal of the withdrawn, fictional world
that drives the rehabilitation of the otaku's image not only in terms of a reaction against youth sexual cultures of the early nineties, but also in terms of
reaction against the violent intervention of the terrorist attacks mounted by
Aum Shinriky6 in 1995. The association between Aum and otaku culture is a
familiar one in Japan: there much of the media coverage that followed the
subway gas attacks focused on Aum as a group, portraying its plots and personalities as part of a bizarre, science fiction-influenced cult, culture, or indeed subculture. Yet Miyadai brings new sophistication to such discussions.
He shows, for example, how the changing profile of the otaku is intertwined with a shift from the Armageddon or apocalyptic tropes of Aum and
Akira to a more intimate sphere of "world type" (sekai-kei) anime-domestic
or school-days dramas that confine themselves largely to the protagonist's
insular inner world. And he traces the shift from the "world type" to the
"battle royale." While the latter offers a more active, even combative form of
social (often online) argument and engagement that appears activist, Miyadai argues that it nonetheless remains resolutely focused on the internal self.
The battle royale's attempts at dialog always end in irony or self-reference.
Finally, Miyadai's essay takes on a self-referential or ironic quality of its own,
when he compares otaku and the other objects of his study to the culture of
sociology itself, showing how the study of other worlds is not autonomous
of their social production.

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS IN THE HISTORY

OF JAPANESE SUBCULTURES SINCE 1992
Since 1993 I have been describing the history of postwar Japanese subcultures by using the framework of social systems theory, in such works

232

MIYADAI SHINJI

.~chaa shinwa kaitai

(1993, Dismantling the subculture myth). z The

of social systems theory is a monistic model based on commuaxon, in which the dynamism of a system is described without requiring
. , ~ent other than communication, unlike the dualistic model based on
aestt ucture and infrastructure.
:rom the era of postwar economic recovery to the era of high economic
J!IW"[h, in other words up to the early 1970s, Japanese subculture could eas :e explained through economic determinism or infrastructural determin.sc- But since the mid-197os, when durable consumer goods reached most
mc:seholds and a level of material affi.uence had been achieved, Japanese
lillxulture has fragmented, and it has become difficult to get a clear perspec':R on it. The significance of my book from fifteen years ago lies in the fact
........ it described the dynamism of subcultures in this era of Japanese post::a.-demity using a coherent framework.
In this work, I divided the history of postwar Japanese subcultures at the
1115?5 1955, 1964, 1973, 1983, and 1992. During the fifteen years since the book
'%rst appeared, there have been a few major shifts in Japanese subcultures. In
;:;;nicular, the shift in 1996 and the shift in 2001 should not be overlooked.
:i?. this essay, I wish to discuss these two shifts.
~"Ork

THE SHIFT OF 1996: THE EQUIVALENCE

OF "REALITY" AND "FICTION"
:::i order to describe Japanese subcultures since the 1990s, it is necessary to
"modified Mita Munesuke schema, which I also used in Sabukaruchaa
shinwa kaitai. According to sociologist Mita Munesuke, postwar subcultures
shift from "the age of ideals (from the war's end in 1945 to 1960) to "the age
of dreams (from 1960 to 1975) to "the age of fiction (after 1975).3 In Sabukaruchaa, I fine-tuned this schema: "the age of ideals was renamed "the age of
"JSe the

order; "the age of dreams became "the age of future; "the age of fiction" became "the age of the self"; and I divided "the age of the selr into two periods
at the year 1996, when the series of Aum Shinriky6-related incidents came to
a close. The early period (prior to 1996) can be called "the age of Armageddon"
and the late period (post-1996) can be called "the age of post-Armageddon."
Let me explain the meaning of those terms as concisely as possible.
In "the age of ideals" or "the age of order," people evaluated reality by
referring to an "ideal order." Boys referred to the Great East Asia Coprosperity Sphere, an ideal order the size of a nation. Girls referred to a home with

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

233

a "good wife, wise mother," an order the size of the family. There are differences, but the national order and the family order are complementary.
In the 1960s, however, the frame of reference in evaluating reality shifts
from an order to a future. Applying my analytical schema, sociologist Tsuji
Izumi argues that, in the shift from the age of order to the age of future,
the most important item for railway fans (tetsudo mania) changes from the
Superexpress Asia of the Manchurian Railroad to the Dream Superexpress
Hikari of the Japanese National Railroad, popularly known as the shinkansen
or "bullet train.'' 4 The Superexpress Asia embodied the lofty ideals of an empire, while the Dream Superexpress Hikari embodied progress toward a future in which flying vehicles travel in all directions. For the former, the frame
of reference is spatial; for the latter, it is temporal. These frames of reference
give a certain dynamism to semantics (imiron)-in other words, a motivation
to approach an ideal order or dream future.
"The age of order" tended to affirm the here-and-now, as it leads from the
family order to the national order. In "the age of future," however, the hereand-how tended to be negated, as something irrational in comparison to the
future. In fact, the 1960s were the age when, while people dreamt of a bright
future, negative news proliferated, such as scandals over industrial pollution,
tainted drugs, the depopulation of rural villages, and vanishing families. The
plot patterns of reading materials for youth also changed. In the age of order,
plots often involved heroes fighting against enemies that threatened the social order, but in the age of future, typical plots involved superior beings from
the future or outer space saving us from the irrationality of society.
The shift from order to future overlapped with the shift from empire to
science. Empire brings about order, while science brings about the future. But
after the Osaka Expo in 1970-an event carrying the banner of science (the
official slogan was "Progress and Harmony for Mankind")-the future that
was supposed to be bright began to fade. As Morikawa Kaichir6 notes, stereotypical images of the future, such as silver rockets being launched diagonally
across the sky or computer data reels spinning, began to fade rapidly after
1970. 5 Probably the biggest reason for this is that the society that was once
poor became affluent as, for example, consumer durable goods reached most
homes.
Now, what becomes the measuring stick for evaluating reality (the hereand-now), after order and then future fade? According to Mita, after an age
in which "reality" was opposed to "ideals," and then one in which it was opposed to "dreams," the age arose in which reality is opposed to "fiction." In
my schema, the measuring stick for evaluating reality shifted from order and

234

MIYADAI SHINJI

then future to the self In other words, in my analysis, "the age of fiction"
amounts to "the age of the self." To be more precise, it is the possibility of the
homeostasis of the self that became the measuring stick for evaluating reality. In this age one utilizes anything-whether it is "reality" or "fiction"-in
order to achieve the homeostasis of the self. That is why it is called the age
of fiction.

The Early and Late Periods in the Age of the Self

The description of Sabukaruchaa shinwa kaitai stops at the year 1992. Since
1992, the biggest watershed year was 1996. Starting around then, "otaku discrimination" began to decrease significantly, and accordingly the "salvation"
or "redemption" of otaku (otaku kyusai) advanced. Furthermore, around this
time, the communication among otaku shifted from the "trivia competition"
(unchiku) to the "play of communication." Allow me to explain.
From about the 1980s on, those who used fiction for the homeostasis of
the self began to be called "otaku," and they began to face discrimination. Many
otaku hated such a reality and escaped to fiction even more, and some even
yearned for an "Armageddon." However, when some of these people caused
the Aum Shinrikyo incidents-indeed, many Aum believers were otaku-it
became ridiculous even for otaku themselves to yearn for an Armageddon.
In addition, involvement with sexual love, once considered "cool," was now
thought to be something that was "painful to watch." Combined with a few
other factors, the view on otaku after 1996 became less discriminatory. Concomitant to this, reality and fiction have come to be thought as equivalent
insofar as they are material to be utilized for the homeostasis of the self. This
corresponds to what Azuma Hiroki called "database consumption.'' 6 Reality
and fiction are registered side by side in the database of material available for
the homeostasis of the self.
With this shift around 1996 as a threshold, I divided the "age of fiction,"
that is to say "the age of the self," into two periods. In the early period, the
concept that fiction is inferior to reality was still maintained. In the late
period, fiction is received as material that is equivalent to reality for the
homeostasis of the self.
In the early period, there was still otaku discrimination, but in the late
period, otaku discrimination disappears. In the early period, the nanpa type 7
and the otaki; type were contrasted, and the otaku type was considered inferior to the former. This, in essence, is otaku discrimination. However, in the
late period, a "flat" viewpoint that the nanpa tendencies are just a hobby and

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

235

are no different from various otaku-like activities began to spread. I call this
"total otaku-ization."
The nanpa type is also called "the Shibuya type" and the otaku type is
also called "the Akiba (Akihabara) type." 8 Morikawa Kaichiro contrasted the
streets of Shibuya lined with buildings featuring large windows (inside are
fashionably dressed youths) and the streets of Akihabara with its windowless
buildings (inside is "another world" [isekai} inundated with character goods). 9
In Sabukaruchaa shinwa kaitai, I associated the nanpa type with "fictionalization of reality" or "dramatization"; and the otaku type with "real-ization of
fiction" or "transformation into another world.'' Morikawa's description is an
application of my description here. Along with Morikawa, I characterize the
nanpa type as those who receive reality with added value, and the otaku type
as those who receive fiction with added value.
In Figure 1, the third quadrant (the nanpa type) represents the semantics characterized by the "fictionalization of reality" and "dramatization.'' In
contrast, the fourth quadrant (the otaku type) represents the semantics characterized by the "real-ization of fiction" and "transformation into another
world.'' And because the difference between reality and fiction has been ftattened-the supremacy of reality has been lost-the distinction between fictionalization of reality and real-ization of fiction has lost its substance. This
is a major reason for the end of otaku discrimination. At the same time, the
concept of total otaku-ization-the idea that everyone is more or less otakubegan to spread. However, as I discussed just now, it is not that the otaku type
(the Akiba type) has approached the nanpa type (the Shibuya type); it is that
the nanpa type has lost its luster and therefore approached the otaku type. In
this sense, the fourth quadrant (the otaku type) expanded and superseded the
third quadrant (the nanpa type) and today's situation came about.
The second period of the age of the "self' began around 1996. Starting
around 1996, the "compensated dating" (enjo kosai) boom began to recede. 10
Concurrently, the idea that the nanpa types are cool began to fade; or rather,
the sense that they are painful to watch began to spread. One phenomenon
indicative of this shift was the ganguro boom among high school girls. 11
The biggest characteristic of this boom was high school girls' rejection of
the male sexual gaze through an intensification of make-up. In addition to
these changes, otaku, having discovered an opportunity for communication
through online services and the Internet, had their feeling of deprivation
lessened through "inclusion." Through such changes, otaku communications
shifted from the trivia competition to the play (or dalliance) of communication. Thus, otaku have been redeemed and no longer feel they have been

236

MIVADAI SHINJI

IV: 1983-PRESENT

PASSIVE

I: LATE MEIJl-1950s

"Bright, right. and strong'' for boys.

"Pure. right. and beautiful' for girls
Birth of boys and girls as sh6nen. shojo
Public decency
Conservative view of sexuality

"Armageddon" motif
Armageddon~ escape from suffering/
agony
Postmodernization -+ devaluatio n
of the importance of 'sexuality"

NORMATIVE

COGNITIVE

(IDEALISTIC)

"Rebellious teenagers"
Deviation fro m wholesome youth culture
Distinctive statement of youngness
The consciousness on "sexuality'

"Self-consciousness'
From the notion of "us" to "me'
' Me" based on consumer societal
symbols
Prevalence of insecurity on "sexuality"

Ill: 1973-PRESENT

ACTIVE

II: 1950s-1970s

FIGURE 1. Historical transition of media communication and youth culture. Figure created by
Miyadai Shinji.

discriminated against. According to Okada Toshio, otaku creativity tapped

into this discrimination-induced depression as a source of creative energy,
and this "otaku redemption" took creativity away from them. This is the reason, Okada argues, why the Wonder Festival, the semiannual show for buying and selling figurines, had to be cancelled once in the winter of 2001. 12
Symbolizing this "otaku redemption" was the "world type" (sekai-kei) boom.

How the Nanpa Type and the Otaku Type Bifurcated

To truly understand the significance of the "otaku redemption," one must
closely examine the "age of the self" since 1975. According to the analysis
in Sabukaruchaa shinwa kaitai, the "age of sex and stage-setting" begins in
1977. Nanpa (womanizing), compa (group dating), and shokai (dating through
friends' introduction) became the most popular activities or events for the
young generation. This includes the disco boom, the "Sheman" boom, the
tennis boom, and so on. 13 Interestingly, also in 19n, the theatrical version
of Space Battleship Yamato (Uchii senkan Yamato) became a hit, and this triggered the launch of the first-ever anime magazines. Because of this simultaneity, it might seem that the otaku-type culture was created as a shelter

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

237

from the nanpa-type culture that was expanding at the time. But, in fact, the
process by which the nanpa type and the otaku type bifurcated was a little
more complicated.
Contrary to what one may think, those who led the age of sex and stagesetting largely overlapped with those who started the trivia competition
about anime and manga. Indicative of this is the fact that many creators and
writers of pop song fan magazines (such as Yoiko no kayokyoku or Remember), which were launched one after another starting in 1976, were fans of
rock music just before. At the roots of both the nanpa type and the otaku
type were high school students of elite Tokyo private schools who began eyecatching behavior as "games no one else can keep up with."
In Sabukaruchaa shinwa kaitai, I called this early overlap of the nanpa type
and the otaku type "the proto-new homo sapiens," i.e., "the proto-otaku." Here
"the new homo sapiens" (shinjinrui) corresponds to the nanpa type. However,
in a later generation, the new homo sapiens (the nanpa type) and the otaku
began to bifurcate. Then, by 1983, the otaku culture became a refuge for those
who could not adjust to the nanpa culture, and younger generations began to
realize this.
One event indicative of this shift is the invention of the term "otaku" by
Nakamori Akio in 1983. This term became popularized after a suspect for the
serial murder and rape of young girls was arrested in 1989, but those familiar
with youth culture, for example marketers and magazine editors, had been
using the term "otaku" since 1983, and with derogatory connotations. From
the 1980s to the mid-199os, the nanpa type (new homo sapiens) were treated
as first-class citizens, while the otaku type were treated as second-class citizens. Otaku discrimination was particularly intense between 1989 (when the
serial murder suspect was arrested) and 1996 (when the compensated dating
boom was at its peak). Incidentally, 1995 was the year Japanese society was
shaken by the Aum Shinrikyo incidents.
It is no coincidence that the Aum Shinrikyo incidents took place at the
height of the age of otaku discrimination. There was a "new religion" boom
from around 1980 to 1995, the year of the Aum incidents. Aum Shinsen No
Kai, the parent organization of Aum, was established in 1984. But in 1980,
around the Kabuki-cha district of Shinjuku in Tokyo, there was a boom of
"nyu fUzoku," or new sex services employing female college or vocational
school students. The burusera boom and the compensated dating boom in the
1990s were extensions of this. In this sense, the period from 1980 to the mid199os was the "age of sexual love," as well as the "age of religion."
I discuss this situation in more detail in Sabukaruchaa shinwa kaitai. In

238

MIYADAI SHINJI

:IT IS NO COINCIOE:NCE:

that book I emphasized the fact that sexual

THAT THE: AUM SHINRIKYO
love and religion are functionally equivalent as
INCIOE:NTS TOOK Pl,..ACE: AT
tools to achieve a "comprehensive acceptance."
THE: HE216HT OF THE: A6E2
The higher the sexual love boom rose, the more
OF OTAKU DISCRIMINATIONpeople were disappointed in sexual love for not
giving them that comprehensive acceptance,
v
and this resulted in the rise of the religion boom as it provided an alternative
source of that comprehensive acceptance. In this sense, the religion boom
was a refuge from the sexual love boom. This is similar to the situation where
the otaku culture was a refuge from the nanpa culture.
Thus, the sexual love boom and the religion boom are functionally equivalent in terms of meeting the demands for comprehensive acceptance. Their
parallel development since around 1980 indeed marks the opening of "the
age of the self," i.e., the age in which the homeostasis of the self is considered
important. This is why I argued in Sabukaruchaa shinwa kaitai (published in
1993) that the keyword after the 1980s is self-defense.
It is very important that this emphasis on the homeostasis of the self or
on self-defense arrived prior to information technology or the database. To
preview the argument to come, the advent of information technology and
databases, first and foremost, enriched the means for the homeostasis of
the self, that is, self-defense; and, secondly, it thereby rapidly weakened the
sense that "reality" (or embodied communication) is more fruitful than "fiction" (or virtual reality). As a result, the priority between reality and fiction
came to be determined by the cost-effectiveness with regard to achieving that
homeostasis. Obviously it takes cost and risk to make arrangements in reality (embodied communication) to achieve the homeostasis of the self, and
thus it is more efficient to achieve it if we do not distinguish reality and fiction. In this way, the two are treated as equivalent.
This development means that, in order to maintain dignity (or self worth),
people become exempt from the necessity of winning recognition through
embodied communication, by having to work within society. Since around
1997, vicious "de-socialized" crimes have been on the rise, in which criminals
kill others without hatred or remorse. One might suspect that this is related
to the change in which individual dignity is less and less tied to society.

From the Early Period to the Late Period of the Age of the Self
To review, 1999 was a threshold between the sense that reality is weightier
than fiction and the otaku's redemption. This influenced the otaku type

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

239

contents as well. In short, the ''Armageddon" disappeared and the "world

type" emerged.
As Tsurumi Wataru argued in Kanzen jisatsu manyuaru (1993, The complete manual of suicide), Armageddon is related to the notion of "resetting
of the world." 14 According to the sociologist Peter Berger's "theory of multiple realities," communication is divided into multiple realms of reality, but
what we call reality is characterized by the irresettability. This inability to
reset made "reality" into "the paramount reality." Reversing Berger's argument, Tsurumi asks if reality cannot indeed be reset. In 1996, Tsurumi, in
Jinkaku kaizo manyuaru (A manual for personality transformation), renamed
my phrase "the endless everyday" as "the world without Armageddon" and
declared, "if Armageddon never comes, we might as well take drugs!" 15 Acknowledging the "failure" of Aum, Tsurumi argues the following: In the past,
it was possible to dream of resetting reality through war or disaster. Since
this became impossible, Aum Shinrikyo's Armageddon fantasy emerged, in
which they tried to bring about Armageddon themselves. When the failure
of Aum became clear evidence of a world without Armageddon, suicide and
drugs emerge as tools to reset reality that are the equivalent of Armageddon.
Tsurumi Wataru's writing since the late 1980s first praised Armageddon,
then suicide, then drugs, and then dance (raves). Tsurumi's activities ended
with Ori no naka no dansu (1998, Dance behind bars), 16 but he does symbolize the early period of the age of the self, considering the fact that his exit
coincides with the appearance of the world type in the late 1990s. In fact, in
the late period of the age of the self, the homeostasis of the self through what
Azuma called "database consumption" made Armageddon or suicide or drugs
unnecessary. The database consumption that gave rise to the world type and
the moe type is equivalent to Armageddon or suicide or drugs before the mid199os in terms of their functionality for resetting reality for the homeostasis
of the self.
In the late period of the age of the self, reflexivity increases. Earlier there
had been a difference in priority between reality and fiction: of course, reality was superior to fiction. However, as a method to juxtapose reality and
fiction as functionally equivalent became generally accepted, irony-the act
of "kicking away the ladder" (or ungrounding) by assigning the whole to a
part-spread. In other words, reality was made subjective through a view
that reality is only "what we think is real."
The act of irony can be represented by the communication "omae me
naa" ("you too!"), which is a phrase (cliche) widely used in 2channel, the biggest Internet bulletin board site in Japan. Such irony relativizes all kinds of

240

MIYADAI SHINJI

HOWeveR, AS A MeTHOD TO
messages, for example by pointing out
JUXTAPOSE: RE:AL-ITY AND FICTION
that the seemingly self-evident assumpAS FUNCTIONAL..L.Y E:QUIVAL-eNT
tion (the whole) is but something chosen by an individual (a part). This results
IRONY-THE: ACT OF "KICKIN6
in an increase in reflexivity. Reflexivity,
AWAY THE: t..ADDE:R" (OR
according to N.iklas Luhmann, is a situUN6ROUNDIN6) 9Y ASS16NIN6
ation where the presupposition for a
THe WHOt..e TO A PART-SPRE:ADchoice is something that has already
been chosen. 17
This kind of irony that increases reflexivity is an obsessive one, contrary
to the detached connotation of the word. Anyone who is familiar with the
communication mode of 2channel can attest to this. The participants on
2channel had no choice but to continue ironic communication for the homeostasis of the self, for self-defense.
In Kyoko no jidai no hate (1996, Beyond the age of fiction), Osawa Masachi suggests "ironical immersion" is a feature of "the age of fiction" in Mita's
schema (or "the age of the self" in mine). 18 He refers to Aum believers' behavioral patterns in which they say they are acting purposely (understanding
fully what they are doing), but in fact they are forced into a situation in which
they have to behave in this way. Osawa expands the scope of ironical immersion wrongly, failing to apply the concept correctly, but if we were to use the
concept correctly it would be as follows:
The presence of irony, in which the whole is relativized by being assigned
to a part, is a separate matter from the presence of obsession, in which one
is forced into using a certain mode of communication. Through theoretical
analysis we may find that irony is a necessary outcome of the functional
equivalence of reality and fiction, and obsession is a necessary outcome of
the need for the homeostasis of the self or self-defense. "Ironical immersion"
refers to the act of self-defense in the age in which reality and fiction became
functionally equivalent. In other words, to have no choice but to continue
making references to reflexivity because of the necessity for homeostasis to
maintain the fragile self: to say "This is all play" or "I know what I'm doing
but I dare do this,'' but to nevertheless sweat over the homeostasis of the self.
This is the correct image for ironical immersion.

Postmodern Reflexivity
As discussed earlier, the functional equivalence of "reality" and "fiction" is
expedient in terms of supplying the homeostasis of the self at a low cost. It

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

241

would be wrong to think, however, that the demands for the homeostasis of
the self caused the fl.at juxtaposition of reality and fiction. Completely unrelated to the issue of the homeostasis of the self, the functional equivalence of
reality and fiction derives from postmodernity. To be more precise, it derives
from the "reflexive modernity" discussed by sociologist Anthony Giddens. 19
Postmodern society is a society in which universal systematization makes
it impossible to have the self-understanding that "we live in the life-world
and utilize the system only for the sake of convenience." Because of universal
systematization, we become aware that the life-world or we who live in it are
after all but the products of the system. Sociologist Max Weber defined modernization by generalizing the procedures that enable calculability. Based on
this definition, social scientist Jurgen Habermas called this domain ruled by
a procedure that enables calculability a system, and called the space not ruled
by this procedure the life-world. This much is well known.
But there is a problem beyond that. This is because "untainted nature"
is in fact only the result of human inaction (or action as inaction), of the act
of not touching-the life-world is also not untainted "native soil" (dochaku).
But for a while, we did not become aware of this and thought that we, living
in the life-world, were proactively and independently (shutaiteki ni) using the
system for the sake of convenience. This age is called modernity, as opposed
to postmodemity.
However, in the 1960s, as seen in philosopher Michel Foucault's critique
of Jean-Paul Sartre, the understanding that "freedom" and "subjectivity" are
but products of a structure or a system began to spread, first in the realms
of philosophy and thought. 20 Then in the 1970s, this understanding spread
more or less to the mass level, when it was widely depicted in novels and in
film, for instance. Thus, all constituents of society came to recognize that the
system provided each constituent with the idea of "one's true self." Spreading
was the recognition that, although we try to utilize the system to recover our
true selves, we have only false subjectivities, and the true subjectivities reside
on the side of the system. In short, it is the recognition that everything is
planned and enacted by the system.
Such a recognition has been popularized by the descriptions of economist
John Galbraith and sociologist Jean Baudrillard. It is not important whether
the description of oneself provided by the system is true or not. What is important is the fact that the self-description useful for the homeostasis of the
self has come to be offered by industrialized services, through advertising
or the discourses of counselors. Through these capitalist activities, the idea
of reflexivity, that "the presupposition for one's choice is itself something

242

MIYADAI SHINJI

that has been chosen," became widely known. This is postmodemity. To put
it more simply, modem society is "bottomless" insofar as it does not have any
unchanging presuppositions, but postmodernity is the age in which many
people become aware of that fact.
Those critics who think that the difference is merely one of awareness
understand post~odernity as late modernity. Those thinkers who pay attention to the fact that such awareness drastically changes the semantics argue
that postmodernity is a stage that comes a~er modernity. In general, many
sociologists take the former position while many artists and creators take the
latter. Regardless, the "age of the self" is the "age of fiction" and at the same
time the "age of reflexivity." In science fiction since the 1950s, Ray Bradbury
and J. G. Ballard predicted that the future would be the age of the industrial
production of self-description. 21 And indeed their predictions came true. In
this sense, the way it turned out was not completely unexpected.

THE SHIFT IN 2001: FROM THE "WORLD TYPE"

TO THE "BATTLE ROYALE TYPE"
Aum Shinrikyo as the "Original World Type"
As I discussed earlier, it is the "world type" that symbolizes the late period
of the age of the self. To understand the significance of the world type, it is
useful to compare it with Aum Shinrikyo, which symbolizes the early period
of the age of the self. At the beginning of this essay, I discussed the Aum
believers' commitment to the idea of Armageddon. Let us examine this more
closely.
As Joyu Fumihiro (the former public relations manager for Aum
Shinrikyo) stated during an interview with me, Aum believers saw Armageddon as a purpose as well as a prophecy: they wanted to fulfill the prophecy
themselves. They spread poison gas themselves to test their own air purifier called the Cosmo-Cleaner, and they tried to bring about an Armageddon
themselves by spreading sarin gas or anthrax. 22 They were even researching
the possibility of triggering an eruption of Mt. Fuji using a plasma-powered
weapon.
Since manipulating "fiction" is lower in cost and risk than manipulating "reality" in mobilizing resources for the homeostasis of the self, fiction
could have a higher value than reality as resource for the homeostasis unless there is a strong notion that fiction is inferior to reality. At least, some

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

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people accepted this estimation. In this context, what is amazing with Aum
Shinrikyo is that, in trying to achieve the homeostasis of the self, they tried
to reset reality completely, rather than fiction, although that option was far
less cost-effective. In other words, it was not the Armageddon of the secondary reality but that of the
WITH THe DE:C&..INE: OP
primary reality that they conspired to bring. How
"ARMA6E:DDON" IN
could such a ridiculous leap or short-circuit become
THE: PRIMARY Rf:AL.ITY,
possible? The biggest reason is that the purpose for
Tl-le "9CHOO&.." 9E:6AN
the Armageddon was the homeostasis of the self,
TO E:MESR6E: IN THe
rather than the realization of social justice or an ideal
9E:CONDARY RE:AL.ITYworld. They sought an Armageddon not in order to
construct an ideal world, but to construct an ideal
self. The whole of the society was considered from the subjective viewpoint
of the homeostasis of the self. In this sense, Aum Shinrikyo was indeed the
"original world type."
But this original world type spectacularly failed as they tried to manipulate the primary reality. Since then, this original world type died out, and
instead the world type involved only with the secondary reality began to rise.
In other words, the "original world type" retreated to the "world type." In
fact, switching places with the failure of Aum Shinrikyo in 1995, the age of
the world type began with the anime TV series Neon Genesis Evangelion (Shin
seiki evangerion) in the fall of 1995. In a review column on current public discourse (rondan jihyo) for Asahi Shimbun in 1996, I discovered a characteristic
of this work in its strange semantics: while Evangelion raises "the mystery
of the world" and "the personal mystery," it only resolves the personal mystery directly, and the direct resolution of that mystery (without explanation)
leads to the resolution of the mystery of the world. Since around 2002, works
dominated by this kind of semantics are called the "world type.''
In my analysis, after the failure of Aum Shinrikyo, it seemed crazy to
manipulate the primary reality from the viewpoint of the homeostasis of the
self, and as a result, with the decline of "Armageddon" in the primary reality,
the "school'' began to emerge in the secondary reality. Of course, schools exist in the primary reality as well, and everyone has memories of their school
days. And this is why the school is invoked in the secondary reality. Armageddon for Aum Shinrikyo is a delusion set in a "future reality"; the school
for the world type is a delusion set in a "past reality." For both, it is not a
delusion qua delusion: while Armageddon is a delusion grounded in what
will certainly happen in the future, school is a delusion grounded in what has
certainly happened in the past. Delusions must refer to reality primarily in

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order to bring intensity to the delusion and to guarantee intersubjectivity.

Incidentally, as a former market researcher, I believe that there is no market for a personal illusion lacking intersubjectivity, and that it is impossible
to commodify such an illusion, as a game for example. In addition, since
one tends to "desire someone else's desire" in a sense, the intensity brought
about by intersubjectivity should not be ignored.

No Armageddon Needed in a School Fantasy

As the first work of the "world type," Evangelion bridges Aum Shinrikyo (the
original world type) and the world type that continues to expand in the new
century. A comment by Anno Hideaki, the director of Evangelion, offers a key
to understanding this: when I had dinner with him, he revealed to me that
he "originally wanted to shoot a post-Armageddon (World War III) 'school
drama.'" Toward the end of the Evangelion TV series, there is a "dream sequence" using the framework of the school drama. Anno stated: "that part
was supposed to be the body of the story." In fact, since Anno was in a state
of depression just before the anime's production, the part about Armageddon
expanded and the whole story became an "Oedipal drama with Armageddon
in the background." But according to Anno, in the initial conception of the
anime, Armageddon (World War III) was required to set up a "school as a paradise,'' much like the stage for the dating simulation game Tokimeki Memorial.
This is interesting: the school drama required a setting after Armageddon. Why? Everyone has school experiences. They may be good experiences
or bad experiences; some have good memories, but some have bitter ones. No
matter what their memories are about school, everyone should have had the
experience of fantasizing an "ideal school that could have been." This is why
many world type manga, games, and novels are set in that kind of school. But
why do people stop fantasizing about the school that could have been? It is
because they grow up. More specifically, it is because they grow up and the
"gravity of society" weighs heavily on them. In the adult world, the kind of
uniformity in school, where everyone is a student, is impossible.
In this way, it is natural to sense that one cannot live in "that school"
again unless the weight of "this reality" is cleared through Armageddon. To
be exact, the shared sense that this is natural, symbolizes the age of Evangelion (the mid-199os). Back then, the gravity of society was great. But then,
the setting in which this reality must be cleared in order to live in that school
gradually became unnecessary. To set up a stage like Tokimeki Memorial, an
"Armageddon" such as World War III ceased to be mandatory. The reason,

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

245

in my estimation, is that the gravity of society weakened and "this reality"

became lighter.
Why did this reality become lighter? One reason is that the series of
Aum-related incidents offered a new self-description. It used to require some
excuse to remain "fictional" without seriously engaging with "reality," but after the Aum incidents, such an excuse was no longer needed. Because of the
Aum incidents, ironically, there emerged a consensus that it is rather dangerous for those crazy people to engage with reality.
The biggest reason that this reality became lighter is that, as what Azuma
Hiroki called "database consumption" became more general, the frame of this
reality expanded all at once. In other words, "this reality" came to mean the
whole of the database useful for the homeostasis of the self, whether its material is reality or fiction; and as a result "this reality" became a "light reality"
that included fiction. In this database, everything available for the homeostasis of the self is registered as this reality. Reality or fiction, mass culture or
high culture, academism or subculture, everything became material for the
homeostasis of the self. The "light reality" in this sense is the main body of
the "world" in the world type.
It is in this sense that the world type represents the late period of the
age of the self. What is lowest in cost and risk is opportunistically chosen
from among functionally equivalent material to maintain the homeostasis
of the self, whether it is reality or fiction. Because of the lightness of this
reality, the oppressive atmosphere once called "ironical immersion" was rapidly relaxed.
The lightening of this reality and the aforementioned disappearance of
otaku discrimination, official recognition of otaku and total otaku-ization of
all forms are perfect parallels. Many otaku became communicative, enjoying
communication. I call them "half-otaku." The "maid cafe" boom since 2003 or
the Train Man (Densha otoko) boom of 2005 symbolize this development from
otaku to half-otaku. As such a development progressed, Akihabara lost the
strangeness of the past and became a tourist spot.

The World Type as a Presupposition for the

Flourishing of the Battle Royale Type
Uno Tsunehiro, a critic of the younger generation, argues that the high point
of the "world type" was between 1996, when Evangelion was aired, and 2000,
when the serialization of Saishu heiki kanojo (She, the Ultimate Weapon) began; he further suggests convincingly that, after around 2001, it shifts over to

246

MIYADAI SHINJI

the battle royale type. 23 This type is represented by such works as Death Note
(Desu noto), the TV drama Joo no kyoshitsu (2005, The queen's classroom),
and the popular manga and TV drama Dragon zakura (2005), that is to say,
stories depicting ruthless dog-eat-dog struggles based on the neoconservative worldview.
Let us r~view the meaning of the "world type," using my own review article from 1997 as a starting point. 24 The world type refers to a group of works,
starting with Neon Genesis Evangelion (or the semantics of such works), in
which the resolution of the "personal mystery" is directly linked to the resolution of the "mystery of the world."
Then how did the world type shift to the battle royale type in such a
short period? What happened to the world type's functions for the homeostasis of the self? These questions have to be asked. It is relatively easy to
answer them. A hint lies in the similarities between Aum Shinrikyo and the
neoconservatives.
As a starting point of our analysis, let us use Uno's definition of the "battle royale type" as a group of works depicting ruthless dog-eat-dog struggles
based on the neoconservative worldview. Needless to say, neoconservatives
are the remains of Trotskyites of the 1960s, who would do "whatever it takes"
for a universal justice, defending a modern society that protects the freedom
of the weak and of minorities. As I have said on many occasions, neoconservatives are strikingly similar to Aum Shinrikyo, in the sense that both would
do whatever it takes for a world.revolution. Both of them give the impression
of being self-centered and simplistic. Probably the reason for this shared impression is that, although they prioritize the order (homeostasis) of the self
over the social order, they ding to the misunderstanding that they are indeed
thinking about the social order. After the failure of Aum Shinrikyo, "reality"
was no longer utilized for the homeostasis of the self, because, using the description above, it became possible to indulge in the fantasy of "the school
that could have been" without the Armageddon that sweeps reality away. But,
for the exact same reason, the neocon fantasies began to multiply.
On the surface, the neocon fantasies of the battle royale type seem like
a regression to Aum-like fantasies. But there is one difference: the keyword
here is justice. The Aum-like fantasy had an Armageddon, but it was weak
in its commitment to justice. Indeed, the homeostasis of the self through
justice characterizes the battle royale type. More abstractly, the dichotomy
of "justice/injustice" is relevant to any game, whether it is real or fictional.
Furthermore, "injustice" is a powerful trap for emotion, capable of offering
shared emotional presuppositions to many, which is why this dichotomy is

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

247

effective as a tool for motivation. The battle royale type uses "justice" to supply the homeostasis of the self. The pursuit of justice may seem social, but in
the battle royale type, the activities of pursuing justice become a game for the
homeostasis of the self.
Such a "battle royale" may be found in the activity called dentotsu or totsu
(short for denwa totsugeki or "telephone call attack"), in which individuals
mobilized on the Internet make complaints on the phone, ask for a response,
and then post the recorded reactions online. The first instance of dentotsu
was the "Toshiba complaints incident" in 1999. A recent, famous example of
this is the "Mainichi WaiWai incident," involving the "WaiWai" section of the
Mainichi Daily News. 25 Among my students there are many famous (or infamous?) charismatic totsu artists. I've collected much information from them.
What's interesting about the dentotsu phenomenon is that the asymmetry between "the revolutionizer" and "the revolutionized," which existed in
Aum Shinrikyo, does not exist here. In the world of dentotsu, which is not
unlike bullying at school, the attacker and the attacked can switch roles at
any moment. The Thai film 13 game sayawng (2006, i3: Game of Death) aptly
depicted the fact that such a situation is a natural consequence of Internet
society. 26 This film scrupulously depicts the structure in which the survival
game in the primary reality becomes a reality-based entertainment for acertain group of spectators and game designers on the Internet, which in tum
become a reality-based entertainment for another group of spectators and
game designers-it is a rhizome-like battle royale, so to speak. This film offers an important recognition: such a rhizomic structure invalidates the distinction between "reality" and "fiction." At the same time, with this lack of
distinction between reality and fiction as a precondition or presupposition,
the rhizome-like battle royale spreads. This is a (vicious) cycle: once it starts,
it cannot be easily stopped.

The Proliferation of Battle Royale and the Weakening

of "Reality" Are Two Sides of the Same Coin
There is no major difference between the world type and the battle royale
type insofar as both of them use whatever is available, whether it is reality
or fiction. If I had to differentiate the two, the world type treats fiction as
an equivalent of reality (real-ization of fiction}, while the battle royale type
treats reality as an equivalent of fiction (fictionalization of reality).
As I discussed earlier, the difference between the otaku type and the
nanpa type (the shinjinrui or new homo sapiens type) is that, while the otaku

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type seeks the "real-ization of fiction" or transformation into another world,

the nanpa type seeks the fictionalization of reality or "dramatization." By referring to this, we may say that the world type is similar to the former while
the battle royale type is similar to the latter. Needless to say, both the world
type and the battle royale type are subcategories within the otaku type. It is
true that there is a chronological development from the world type of the late
1990s to the battle royale type of the 2000s, but as the nanpa type and the
otaku type coexisted side by side for a long time, among Internet users those
with world type inclinations and those with the battle royale type coexist.
While the antagonism between the otaku type and the nanpa type emerged in
the age in which "reality" and "fiction" were believed to have different values,
the antagonism between the world type and the battle royale type emerged
in the age in which reality and fiction are regarded as equivalent tools for
self-defense. It is noteworthy that the difference in the reality construction
strategy between the otaku type and the nanpa type has made a parallel translation to the difference in reality construction strategy between the world
type and the battle royale type within the otaku type. It is important to recall,
however, that this parallel translation into the otaku type was made possible
by the "total otaku-ization" around 1996, which also enabled the shift from
the "original world type" (Armageddon!) to the "world type" (school!).
In this sense, in comparison with the watershed moment of 1996 when
the world type first emerged, there is no clear-cut moment in which the battle
royale type first emerged. As I discussed earlier, the method of maintaining
the homeostasis of the self using justice as a keyword existed from roughly
the same time as the emergence of the world type, if we were to include in
them those "Korea-hating kids" (kenkanchu; those Internet users who bash
South Korea). In this sense, it is appropriate to understand that the world
type and the battle royale type are but two manifestations of the equivalence
of reality and fiction in terms of the homeostasis of the self. In addition, I
wish to draw your attention to the fact that this equivalence of reality and
fiction emerged in parallel development with the collapse of hierarchy on the
side of "reality."
Let me give you an example: the book Tokusatsu kensatsu vs. kin'yu kenryoku (2007, Special investigation prosecutors vs. financial authority) by Murayama Osamu, who is on the editorial board of the Asahi shinbun, one of
Japan's major daily newspapers. 27 It is an excellent nonfiction book depicting
the struggles between the Public Prosecutor's Office and the Office of Financial Policies. This book scrupulously describes intense power struggles under
the surface, though we see only the tip of the iceberg. Recently major players

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

249

in this battle have begun to appear on TV as commentators, but their commentary and behavior have been all too mediocre.
How should we understand the gap between the power they had possessed and their weak appearance on TV? This question is a variation of the
question: how do we understand the weight of "reality"? My answer is as follows: it has always been true that someone can be an amazing player in one
game but a mediocre player in another. But in the past, each game was clearly
segregated from others, and a player of one game did not have to play any
other. This fact maintained the stratified order. But these days the barriers
between such games have collapsed, and there arise many situations in which
the hero of one game makes a fool of him- or herself in another. As a result of
this, the stratified order of "reality" collapsed. Nobody is capable of saying, a
priori, which game is more privileged than another.
There are numerous episodes suggesting the situation where a powerful
player in one context ("game") can be an all-too-mediocre one in another. For
example, in Fahrenheit 9/11, a documentary directed by Michael Moore, there
is a scene in which Paul Wolfowitz, the former deputy secretary of defense
and an influential neocon politician, is standing in front of a TV camera.28
That effete, frail, diminutive man combing his hair is "it." Many in the audience must have smiled bitterly.
In the age of the battle royale type, which followed the world type, the
equivalence of reality and fiction is presupposed, and fictionalization of reality (the attitude in which one lives reality as if it were a game) becomes more
prominent. In this age, the stratified order is invalidated in reality itself, as
the ladders are knocked out from under the feet of of "great" figures and
institutions themselves, and as a result the "fictionalization of reality" becomes even easier. The dentotsu artists' Internet expose, which reveals the
shoddy customer support or the internal confusion of major corporations,
only underscores this fact. (The "Mainichi WaiWai incident" is a prime example of this.) In this sense, the proliferation of battle royale and the loss of
the weight of reality are two sides of the same coin.

IN CONCLUSION: THE EVER-CONTINUING

BATTLE ROYALE PROCESS.
As the stratified order collapsed and, in a parallel development, the order of
"reality" and "fiction" collapsed, the world type engaging in real-ization of
fiction and the battle royale type engaging in fictionalization of reality both

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IN THE: A6E! OF THE! SATTW:

began to spread. In other words, "people
ROYAw: TYPE!, WHICH
living a game as if it were reality" and
FOW..OWE!D THE: WORf...D TYPE!,
"people living reality like a game" are inTHE: E:QUIVAw:NCE! OF RE!Af...ITY
creasing. In 1996 the former became more
AND FICTION IS PRE!SUPPOSE!O,
conspicuous; after 2001 the latter became
AND FICTIONAf...IZATION OF
more conspicUO\IS.
RE!Af...ITY (THE! ATTITUDE! IN
At the heart of the intellectual tradiWHICH ONE! f...IVE!S RE:Af...ITY AS
tion of sociology is an undermining of
IF IT WE!RE! A 6AME!) SE!COME!S
self-evidence by "rethinking the presuppositions" or "referring to the contexts." It
examines presupposition, then a presupposition of the presupposition, then a presupposition of that presupposition
... or a context, then a context of the context, then a context of the context
of the context, and so on. As one reverts back further and further, the unshakable framework becomes so flimsy that solid justice and grand authority
disappear. Sociological analysis has such a function, which we may call relativization through reflexion. In other words, sociology is about pointing out
how everything is arbitrary, including our own act of pointing it out. Therefore, sociology, by nature, is good at the "you too!" (omae mo naa!) mode of
communication often seen on 2channel. Since we are immune to this kind of
communication, we will not lose motivation in the process of relativization
(at least we should not).
But not all members of society are sociologists. Some people can survive
these tendencies that are saturating communication in society: the endless
game of removing each other's ladders or the quagmire of reflexivity (saikisei
no doronuma); others cannot. These tendencies are symbolized in the equivalence of reality and fiction, which presupposes the collapse of the stratified
order in reality. For how long can people endure this situation? At the least
we need some people who can endure the "endless game of removing each
other's ladders" and the "quagmire of reflexivity," withstand the avalanche
of "you too!" communication, survive the "battle royale," and carry out their
original ideals. They should not only continue criticism but also continue to
engage in designing society while enduring unceasing criticism. In a society
with high reflexivity (i.e., the situation where the presupposition for a choice
is something that has already been chosen), failing to participate in social
design unwittingly is tantamount to a deliberate choice. 29
From now on, social design not only inevitably but also indispensably requires "designers" to remove each other's ladders. This is because, in a social
system with high reflexivity, it is impossible to approach the social totality

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

25J

without an intricate rhizome of a perspective that questions the function of

a perspective, which in turn questions the function of a perspective, and so
on ad infinitum. It follows that the social designer (i.e., the architect) must
be involved not only in the primary reality but also in secondary or tertiary
realities. For "this reality" now includes both "reality" and "fiction," and we
become aware of the arbitrariness of the boundary between the two. In this
sense, the sensibility of the battle royale type is indispensable for those involved in social design.
It has already been fourteen years since reality and fiction have become functionally equivalent from the standpoint of the homeostasis of the
self, and it has been more than ten years since the opposition between the
world type and the battle royale type has become visible. As I discussed in
Sabukaruchaa shinwa kaitai, postwar Japanese subcultures have had five- to
seven-year cycles. In this sense, a period of fourteen years or even ten years is
unusually long. It is difficult to identify a watershed moment in the past ten or
fourteen years. In my hypothesis, the situation of the past ten plus years-in
which reality and fiction became functionally equivalent from the standpoint
of the homeostasis of the self and in which the world type who lives "fiction
(a game)" like "reality" has been differentiated from the battle royale type who
lives "reality" like "fiction (a game)"-is in a kind of dynamic equilibrium, a
stasis. I suppose that this situation will continue for a considerably long time.
Sociological thinking used to take the bifurcation of reality and fiction
as a self-evident presupposition; it was responsible only for analyzing the
order of reality. I believe that such a traditional framework will become unacceptable. Sociology has analyzed the structure and architecture of reality,
but since structures and architectures also exist for fiction-that is, for the
secondary or tertiary realities-and since fiction is received as part of "this
reality," the analytical framework of sociology must expand as well.

EPILOGUE: 1992 PAVING THE WRY FOR 1996

In the pages preceding, I discussed the shift in 1996 and the shift around
2001. In the epilogue that follows, I wish to revert and touch upon the shift
in 1992. I have treated the 1992 shift in the chapter "Pop Music's Mode of
Reception Changes through Karaoke-ization" in Sabukaruchaa shinwa kaitai
(published the following year, in 1993). Let me elaborate on this work.
The shift in 1992 is in a sense greater than the shift in 1996 or in 2001.
In 1992 there were drastic, simultaneous shifts in the mode of reception of

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:nusic, adult video, erotic magazines, sexual love, sexual services, and prostitution. I call the common denominator of all of these contemporaneous
shifts "the loss of aura." The "loss of aura" is what philosopher Walter Benjamin pointed out as the biggest change brought about in the age of mechanical reproduction. 30 "Aura" originally referred to the divinity that descended
upon the earth i~ the Advent. The loss of aura means that God no longer
descends to earth.
Benjamin used the loss of aura as a metaphor for the following situation: according to Benjamin, sculpture has more aura than painting; painting has more aura than photography; photography has more aura than film;
film has more aura than television. In other words, there is a vivid sense that
it is a substitution for something original-the sense that "in this resides
something authentic that is not here." It is not that the kind of media will
determine the degree of aura directly. The characteristic that it is an expression of something real can be best understood if we consider masturbation.
First, there is masturbation in which one is excited by the real thing. Second,
there is masturbation in which one is excited by a media expression of the
real thing. Finally, there is masturbation that is excited by an expression that
is not an expression of the real thing (such as animation). Aura decreases in
this order, but what is important is that, while some men get excited about
the real thing, presupposing the distinction in the degrees of aura, other men
get excited about the real thing in the flat state without any distinction in
the degree of aura (for example without distinguishing the real thing from
animation).
First of all, allow me to discuss the mode of reception of music. There was
a karaoke boom in 1992, but concomitant to this, the form of the reception
of music changed. In the past, the common mode was immersion, in which
one immerses him- or herself into the "scenes" or "relationality" that the music represents. That changed completely after the karaoke boom. Karaoke is
used as a communication tool for having a good time with people who are
not necessarily friends. It's a repetition of someone singing, followed by applause, then someone else singing, and so on. Self-centered, self-immersed
singing should be avoided, and one is supposed to sing the songs that everyone knows. The suppliers of music, responding to this mode of reception,
began to sell songs that were tied to TV commercials, TV dramas, and motion
pictures, in order to supply songs that everyone knows. In this way, the sense
that music is an expression about something has rapidly diminished. Instead,
new criteria for evaluation were introduced: whether everyone knows it and
whether everyone can have a good time with it. In this sense, music became

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253

AROUND 1"2 THe

we16HT OF "ReAl-ITY"
ee6AN TO DIMINISH
QUITe RAPIDL-Y- AND ITS
we16HT COMP&..eTeL-Y
DISAPPeAReD IN 1996-

a kind of consumer good, like fashion or cosmetics. Such production and consumption of music became typical even before the distribution of music
through the Internet became common.
After music ceased to become a tool of expression, it ceased to become a fashion item as well. On
the supplier side, music became archived, as seen in
the iTunes Music Store; on the consumer side, there was "nebularization"that is to say, the division of the field into isolated island-universes. As a
result, people no longer have to buy CDs and access new songs to keep up
with the latest hits. One could interpret it in this way: this move away from
fashion was triggered by the move away from expression, as music was no
longer required in order to refer to contemporaneous contexts. In this way,
one became able to .search the archive simply in terms of whether certain
songs "feel good or not," irrespective of the context of whether everyone
knows the songs.
Next let us look at the mode of reception of adult videos (i.e., pornography). In 1992 there was a shift from individual titles to titles based on themes
in the world of adult videos. Before this, there were well-known actresses
who would appear in the videos and be paid wages on the order of one million yen per title. But since 1992, as the industry shifted from the rental video
business model to the sales business model, amateurs (hiding their faces with
mosaic patterns on screen) began to appear for less than one hundred thousand yen per title, as if it were a part-time job. In terms of the contents, works
with rich stories became rare and instead most works pinpointed very specific sexual tastes, such as scatology, fetishes (such as schoolgirl uniforms),
and special situations (such as groping on a crowded train). To put it simply, pornography shifted from mass production to small-scale production of
varied titles. This "pinpointing" has accelerated through the proliferation of
adult video on the Internet. This is similar to the situation with music. Concomitant to this was anime-ization of adult videos. In this way, adult videos
are no longer an expression about a certain popular actress or an expression
about a certain story. The users of adult videos no longer get excited about
actresses or stories; they get excited about the fetish images in front of them,
detached from contexts. They no longer have to fast forward the video; the
videos are sold "already fast-forwarded."
Let us turn to erotic magazines. In the world of erotic magazines, there
was a shift from the text-based to the image-based in 1992. Earlier, the main
feature of the erotic magazine was text, as pictures and photographs were

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mostly for the purpose of illustrating the texts. But in new erotic magazines,
the main feature became "gravure" (photographs of swimsuit models) and
illustrations, and the texts were relegated to the captions attached to those
images. In this way, while one used to fantasize about something the text
describes (with the text as a medium), now the reader responds directly to
the visual stimuli of the erotic photographs, erotic illustrations, and erotic
anime. This is.the shift from the text-based to the image-based. The aura resided in the text-based media, because the text was a substitute for the real
thing; but the image-based media are just stimulants.
Finally, let us look at the "burusera" phenomenon in the sex industry. In
burusera shops, high school girls sell their underwear or uniforms to a shop
and the shop in turn sells them to male customers. Starting in 1992 actual
high school girls began to sell real underwear or uniforms. Before that, real
housewives and office ladies (OLs) sold their underwear. I called the phenomenon of many high school girls selling their underwear and uniforms the "burusera" phenomenon. It was I who publicized this phenomenon in Japan, by
writing about it in newspaper columns and magazine articles. Thanks to this
effort, I was given the title of "the burusera sociologist." One year after the
burusera phenomenon, with the "dating club" boom of 1993 to 1996, came the
so-called compensated dating boom. I did fieldwork on this and introduced
it widely.
In these two booms, burusera and compensated dating, I noted the loss
of aura. As I discussed earlier, young men began to be excited by anime or
manga characters just like they are by real high school girls. Anime or manga
were not substitutes for the real thing. Anime, manga, and the real thing were
received almost as equivalents. In Seifuku shojo no sentaku (1994, The choice of
schoolgirls in uniform), I expressed this situation as the "symbolic reception"
of the real thing. As I discussed in detail in this book, the high school girls
themselves flattened rough bumps of reality by using such "signs" as "funny
old man" (henna ojisan) or "cute old man" (kawaii ojisan). In this way, both on
the side of male customers and of high school girls, the flattening of reality or
fictionalization of reality occurs, where "reality" is grasped as an aggregate of
signs. There, signs neither represent reality nor substitute for it. Reality itself
is consumed as signs. Conversely, signs themselves are consumed as "reality."
The aura, or the divinity of reality, in which the "real" exists behind signs, was
rapidly diminishing.
In this way, around 1992 the weight of "reality" began to diminish quite
rapidly. And its weight completely disappeared in 1996, when the method of
regarding reality and fiction as functionally equivalent from the viewpoint of

TRANSFORMATION OF SEMANTICS

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the homeostasis of the self quickly spread. In this sense, 1992 paved the way
for 1996. As I discussed above, the series of Aum incidents in 1995 was one of
the events that triggered the shift from the Armageddon type to the world
type, but the mass-scale loss of aura in 1992 had provided a precondition or
presupposition necessary for this.

Notes
This essay is based on a lecture given at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, on April 1,
2009.
1. [Luhmann discusses this in Social Systems, trans. John Bednarz, Jr., with Dirk
Baecker (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1995), 163. -Trans.]
2. Miyadai Shinji, Ishihara Hideki, and Otsuka Meiko, Sabukaruchaa shinwa kaitai:
Shojo, ongaku, manga, sei no 30 nen to komyunikeeshon no genzai (Dismantling the subculture myth: The present state of communication and thirty years of shojo, music, manga,
and sex) (Tokyo: Parco Shuppan, 1993); revised and expanded as Zoho sabukaruchaa shinwa
kaitai: ShOjo, ongaku, manga, sei no hen'yo to genzai (Dismantling the subculture myth [the
expanded edition]: The changing state and present state of shojo, music, manga, and sex)
(Tokyo: Chikuma Shobo, 2007).
3. [Mita Munesuke (b. 1937) is professor emeritus of sociology at the University
of Tokyo. Mita's discussion of this three-part periodization of postwar Japan has been
translated in Mita Munesuke, "Reality, Dream and Fiction-Japan, 1945," in Social Psychology of Modem Japan, trans. Stephen Suloway, 515-27 (London: Kegan Paul International,
1992). Mita's schema has been quite influential in Japanese critical discourses since the
1990s. Besides Miyadai, Osawa Masachi elaborated on Mita's schema in Kyoko no jidai no
hate (Beyond the age of fiction) (Tokyo: Chikuma Shinsho, 1996), to which Azuma Hiroki
in tum responded in his discussion of the "animal age." See Azuma Hiroki, Otaku: Japan's
Database Animals, trans. Jonathan E. Abel and Shion Kono (Minneapolis: University of
Minnesota Press, 2009), 73-74, 89-90. -Trans.]
4. Tsuji Izumi, "Tetsudo no imiron to 'shonen bunka' no hensen: Nihon shakai no
kindaika to sono kako genzai mirat (The semantics of the railroad and the vicissitudes
of "boy culture": Modernization of Japanese society and its past, present, and future)
(PhD diss., Tokyo Metropolitan University, 2008).
5. See Morikawa Kaichiro, Shuto no tanjo: Moeru toshi Akihabara (Leaming from
Akihabara: The birth of a personapolis) (Tokyo: Gentosha, 2003).
6. See Azuma, Otaku.
7. ["Nanpa kei" in the original. "Nanpa" (lit. "the soft school") originally referred to
young men interested in womanizing but is now more often used as a verb, referring to
the act of "picking up" women or "womanizing." "Kei" is rendered in this translation as
"type" throughout (e.g., "otaku type" and "Shibuya type" for "otaku kei" and "Shibuya kei;
respectively). -Trans.]
8. [In the original, "Akiba kei," with "Akiba" being a shorthand for Akihabara.
-Trans.]

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IVllYAOAI SHINJI

9. See Morikawa, Shuto no tanjo.

10. [Compensated dating (enjo kosai) is the term widely used in Japan in the 1990s to
refer to the phenomenon of schoolgirls dating older men for money (with or without sex).
At that time Miyadai was at the center of media debate on this phenomenon and fiercely
defended the girls, arguing that this is a liberating act. -Trans.]
11. [Ganguro (literally "black face") was a fashion trend among urban young girls
around 2000, chara~terized by an overly tanned face and white makeup around the eyes.
-Trans.]
12. Hayami Yukiko, "Gendai no shozo Okada Toshio" (A Contemporary Portrait: Okada
Toshio), AERA (November 4, 2002): 72-77.
13. [Shonan is a beach resort in Kanagawa prefecture near Tokyo. Around 1980 it was
a center of youth subculture associated with surfing and rock music. -Trans.]
14. Tsurumi Wataru, Kanzenjisatsu manyuaru (A complete manual of suicide) (Tokyo:
Ota Shuppan, 1993).
15. Tsurumi Wataru, Jinkaku kaizo manyuaru (A manual for personality transformation) (Tokyo: Ota Shuppan, 1996).
16. Tsurumi Wataru, Ori no naka no dansu (Dance behind bars) (Tokyo: Ota Shuppan,
1998). [The book deals with the author's experience in prison after being arrested for drug
possession -Trans.]
17. In Social Systems, Niklas Luhmann explains reflexivity as "when the basic distinction [for self-reference] is between before and a~er [an elemental event]." Luhmann had
called this "processual self-reference" in several of his papers during the 1970s. When
learning becomes reflexive it is "learning about learning"; when a choice becomes reflexive,
it is "a choice about a choice."
"The distinction between before and a~er [an elemental event]" refers to the fact that
the "before learning/after learning" distinction is inherent in the concept of learning, and
that the "before a choice/after a choice" distinction is inherent in the concept of a choice.
Building on this, "the self-reference based on the distinction between before and a~er"
means that the "before learning/after learning" distinction is applied to the "before learning/after learning" distinction itself, and the "before a choice/after a choice" distinction to
the "before a choice/after a choice" distinction itself.
This is a difficult expression typical of Luhmann, but it is what he had called "learning
about learning" or "a choice about a choice" in his earlier papers. "Leaming about learning"
here derives from Gregory Bateson's idea of "learning to learn"; Bateson states that the
reflexive process of "learning to learn" is an effective way of increasing the rate of learning.
In my terminology, "learning to learn" (i.e. learning about learning method) is "learning
about presuppositions for learning" and "a choice about a choice" (i.e. a choice about selection method) is "a choice about presuppositions for a choice." For the learning method is
a presupposition for individual learning, and method of selection is a presupposition for
individual choices. Herbert A. Simon also states that the selection of particular choices out
of all possible ones, as well as the selection process itself are presuppositions for individual
selections. Gregory Bateson, Steps to an Ecology of Mind (New York: Ballantine Books,
1972), 166-176; Herbert A. Simon, Administrative Behavior (New York: The Free Press,
1976), 3-4.
18. Osawa, Kyoko no jidai no hate.

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257

19. See, for example, Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1990).
20. Michel Foucault and Madeleine Chapsal, "Entretien avec Michel Foucault"
(An Interview with Michel Foucault), La Quinzaine Litteraire 15 (May 1966): 14-15. Sartre
responded to this in Jean-Paul Sartre and Bernard Pingaud, "Jean-Paul Sartre repond"
(Sartre Responds), LJ\rc 30 (1966): 87-96.
21. In Fahrenheit 451 (1951), Ray Bradbury describes a scene in which people are
driven to certain consumer behavior through constant messages from a television about
"what one should be." An updated version of Bradbury's vision appears in J. G. Ballard's
Kingdom Come (2006). The protagonist, who is waging an advertising war from a cable
TV studio in a shopping mall, becomes an instigator of shopping mall fascism, and the
violence among agitated people escalates without end. Both of these novels depict a situation in which the (potentially profit-driven) call to recover one's true self can bring about
mass consequences unimaginable even to the author of that call. Ballard's Vermillion Sands
(1971) also depicted the ways in which the system penetrates deeply into people's sensibilities, although Ballard's depiction there is not completely negative.
22. [The Cosmo-Cleaner was named after a device in the anime Space Battleship
Yamato. -Trans.]
23. See Uno Tsunehiro, Zero nendai no sozoryoku (Imagination in the OOs) (Tokyo:
Hayakawa Shobe, 2008). [Uno's argument in the book, summarized here by Miyadai, is
that Japanese popular culture of the 2000s has shifted from the insularity of sekai kei to
the bold, willful motifs of ketsudan shugi (decisivism). The film Battle Royale (2000, Batoru
rowaiyaru) signals this shift for Uno. -Trans.]
24. Miyadai Shinji, "Shinkuroritsu no hikui sei: 'Genjitsu wa omoi' kankaku" (Life
with a low synchronization rate: The sense of "heavy reality"), Asahi shinbun, 26 February
1997, evening edition.
25. [In this incident in 2008 the Mainichi shinbun apologized for years of publishing
unfounded, sexually lurid stories. -Trans.]
26. 13 game sayawng, dir. Chukiat Sakveerakul (2006); released in the United States
as 13: Game of Death, DVD (Weinstein Company, 2008).
27. Murayama Osamu, Tokusatsu kensatsu vs. kin'yli kenryoku (Special investigations
prosecutors vs. financial authority) (Tokyo: Asahi Shimbun Shuppan, 2007).
28. Fahrenheit 9111, dir. Michael Moore, DVD (Sony Pictures, 2004).
29. [The term "social design" appears in katakana in the original. Miyadai's notion of
social design, as one can see in his argument here, is a highly reflexive act peculiar to lateor postmodemity (as opposed to the top-down, rigid planning implied in such terms as
"social planning" or "social engineering"). -Trans.]
30. Walter Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction," in
Illuminations, ed. Hannah Arendt, trans. Harry Zohn (New York: Harcourt, 1968), 217-51.

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MIVAOAI SHINJI

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